Valuing what happens: a biogenic approach to valence and (potentially) affect

Valence is half of the pair of properties that constitute core affect, the foundation of emotion. But what is valence, and where is it found in the natural world? Currently, this question cannot be answered. The idea that emotion is the body's way of driving the organism to secure its survival, thriving and reproduction runs like a leitmotif from the pathfinding work of Antonio Damasio through four book-length neuroscientific accounts of emotion recently published by the field's leading practitioners. Yet while Damasio concluded 20 years ago that the homeostasis–affect linkage is rooted in unicellular life, no agreement exists about whether even non-human animals with brains experience emotions. Simple neural animals—those less brainy than bees, fruit flies and other charismatic invertebrates—are not even on the radar of contemporary affective research, to say nothing of aneural organisms. This near-sightedness has effectively denied the most productive method available for getting a grip on highly complex biological processes to a scientific domain whose importance for understanding biological decision-making cannot be underestimated. Valence arguably is the fulcrum around which the dance of life revolves. Without the ability to discriminate advantage from harm, life very quickly comes to an end. In this paper, we review the concept of valence, where it came from, the work it does in current leading theories of emotion, and some of the odd features revealed via experiment. We present a biologically grounded framework for investigating valence in any organism and sketch a preliminary pathway to a computational model. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Basal cognition: conceptual tools and the view from the single cell’.

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Grounding cognition: heterarchical control mechanisms in biology

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences ◽

10.1098/rstb.2019.0751 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 376 (1820) ◽

pp. 20190751 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

William Bechtel ◽

Leonardo Bich

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Single Cell ◽

Autonomous Systems ◽

Internal Models ◽

Living Systems ◽

Control Mechanisms ◽

Theme Issue ◽

Variable Nature ◽

Heterarchical Control ◽

Production Mechanisms

We advance an account that grounds cognition, specifically decision-making, in an activity all organisms as autonomous systems must perform to keep themselves viable—controlling their production mechanisms. Production mechanisms, as we characterize them, perform activities such as procuring resources from their environment, putting these resources to use to construct and repair the organism's body and moving through the environment. Given the variable nature of the environment and the continual degradation of the organism, these production mechanisms must be regulated by control mechanisms that select when a production is required and how it should be carried out. To operate on production mechanisms, control mechanisms need to procure information through measurement processes and evaluate possible actions. They are making decisions. In all organisms, these decisions are made by multiple different control mechanisms that are organized not hierarchically but heterarchically. In many cases, they employ internal models of features of the environment with which the organism must deal. Cognition, in the form of decision-making, is thus fundamental to living systems which must control their production mechanisms. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Basal cognition: conceptual tools and the view from the single cell’.

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Interacting roles of lateral and medial Orbitofrontal cortex in decision-making and learning : A system-level computational model

10.1101/867515 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Bhargav Teja Nallapu ◽

Frédéric Alexandre

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Prefrontal Cortex ◽

Computational Model ◽

Orbitofrontal Cortex ◽

Temporal Dynamics ◽

System Level ◽

Interacting Networks ◽

Cortical Regions ◽

Experimental Findings

AbstractIn the context of flexible and adaptive animal behavior, the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is found to be one of the crucial regions in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) influencing the downstream processes of decision-making and learning in the sub-cortical regions. Although OFC has been implicated to be important in a variety of related behavioral processes, the exact mechanisms are unclear, through which the OFC encodes or processes information related to decision-making and learning. Here, we propose a systems-level view of the OFC, positioning it at the nexus of sub-cortical systems and other prefrontal regions. Particularly we focus on one of the most recent implications of neuroscientific evidences regarding the OFC - possible functional dissociation between two of its sub-regions : lateral and medial. We present a system-level computational model of decision-making and learning involving the two sub-regions taking into account their individual roles as commonly implicated in neuroscientific studies. We emphasize on the role of the interactions between the sub-regions within the OFC as well as the role of other sub-cortical structures which form a network with them. We leverage well-known computational architecture of thalamo-cortical basal ganglia loops, accounting for recent experimental findings on monkeys with lateral and medial OFC lesions, performing a 3-arm bandit task. First we replicate the seemingly dissociate effects of lesions to lateral and medial OFC during decision-making as a function of value-difference of the presented options. Further we demonstrate and argue that such an effect is not necessarily due to the dissociate roles of both the subregions, but rather a result of complex temporal dynamics between the interacting networks in which they are involved.Author summaryWe first highlight the role of the Orbitofrontal Cortex (OFC) in value-based decision making and goal-directed behavior in primates. We establish the position of OFC at the intersection of cortical mechanisms and thalamo-basal ganglial circuits. In order to understand possible mechanisms through which the OFC exerts emotional control over behavior, among several other possibilities, we consider the case of dissociate roles of two of its topographical subregions - lateral and medial parts of OFC. We gather predominant roles of each of these sub-regions as suggested by numerous experimental evidences in the form of a system-level computational model that is based on existing neuronal architectures. We argue that besides possible dissociation, there could be possible interaction of these sub-regions within themselves and through other sub-cortical structures, in distinct mechanisms of choice and learning. The computational framework described accounts for experimental data and can be extended to more comprehensive detail of representations required to understand the processes of decision-making, learning and the role of OFC and subsequently the regions of prefrontal cortex in general.

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A Computational Model of Non-optimal Suspiciousness in the Minnesota Trust Game

10.31234/osf.io/kwe8p ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Rebecca Kazinka ◽

Iris Vilares ◽

Angus MacDonald

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Risk Aversion ◽

Computational Model ◽

Inequity Aversion ◽

Trust Game ◽

Social Decision ◽

Future Studies ◽

Two Samples ◽

Highly Correlated ◽

Social Decision Making

This study modeled spite sensitivity (the worry that others are willing to incur a loss to hurt you), which is thought to undergird suspiciousness and persecutory ideation. Two samples performed a parametric, non-iterative trust game known as the Minnesota Trust Game (MTG). The MTG is designed to distinguish suspicious decision-making from otherwise rational mistrust by incentivizing the player to trust in certain situations. Individuals who do not trust even under these circumstances are particularly suspicious of their potential partner’s intentions. In Sample 1, 243 undergraduates who completed the MTG showed less trust as the amount of money they could lose increased. However, for choices where partners had a financial disincentive to betray the player, variation in the willingness to trust the partner was associated with suspicious beliefs. To further examine spite sensitivity, we modified the Fehr-Schmidt (1999) inequity aversion model, which compares unequal outcomes in social decision-making tasks, to include the possibility for spite sensitivity. In this case, an anticipated partner’s dislike of advantageous inequity (i.e., guilt) parameter could take on negative values, with negative guilt indicating spite. We hypothesized that the anticipated guilt parameter would be strongly related to suspicious beliefs. Our modification of the Fehr-Schmidt model improved estimation of MTG behavior. We isolated the estimation of partner’s spite-guilt, which was highly correlated with choices most associated with persecutory ideation. We replicated our findings in a second sample, where the estimated spite-guilt parameter correlated with self-reported suspiciousness. The “Suspiciousness” condition, unique to the MTG, can be modeled to isolate spite sensitivity, suggesting that spite sensitivity is separate from inequity aversion or risk aversion, and may provide a means to quantify persecution. The MTG offers promise for future studies to quantify persecutory beliefs in clinical populations.

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Bacon’s Metaphysical Method

Epistemology & Philosophy of Science ◽

10.5840/eps202158340 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 58 (3) ◽

pp. 22-37

Author(s):

Daniel Garber ◽

Keyword(s):

Scientific Method ◽

Natural Philosophy ◽

World View ◽

Natural World ◽

Scientific Domain ◽

General Schema

In this paper, I would like to examine the method that Bacon proposes in Novum organum II.1-20 and illustrates with the example of the procedure for discovering the form of heat. One might think of a scientific method as a general schema for research into nature, one that can, in principle, be used independently of the particular conception of the natural world which one adopts, and independently of the particular scientific domain with which one is concerned. Indeed, Bacon himself suggested that as with logic, his method, or as he calls it there his “system of interpreting” is widely applicable to any domain, and not just to natural philosophy. [Novum organum I.127] Now, recent studies of Bacon have emphasized his own natural philosophical commitments, and the underlying conception of nature that runs through his writings. In my essay I argue that the method Bacon illustrates in Novum organum II is deeply connected to this underlying view of nature: far from being a neutral procedure for decoding nature, Bacon’s method is a tool for filling out the details of a natural philosophy built along the broad outlines of the Baconian world view.

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Forced Moves or Just Good Moves? Rethinking Environmental Decision-Making among East African Intensive Cultivators

Humans and the Environment ◽

10.1093/oso/9780199590292.003.0012 ◽

2013 ◽

Author(s):

Matthew I. J. Davies

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Technological Development ◽

Natural World ◽

Dynamic Interaction ◽

Dynamic Decision Making ◽

East African ◽

Social Sciences And Humanities ◽

Individual Agency ◽

Environmental Decision Making ◽

Course Of Action

There has been a tendency in archaeology and in related social sciences and humanities to view human cultures as simply ‘adapted’ to or ‘in tune’ with ‘nature’ (Binford 1962; Butzer 1982; Steward 1955a; White 1959). Nature in this view is difficult to define and is principally considered in opposition to culture; it is not culture, it is external to humans, and it has an active causality of its own. This is often true even when researchers have been considering phenomena with a distinctly ‘human’ flavour such as population growth or technological development; both have often been seen as ‘natural’ aspects of human behaviour, as things which ‘just happen’. In such thinking, when human societies are impacted by nature (conceived of as a phenomenon emanating from outside of the human realm) their responsive action or behaviour is often considered to be ‘forced’, in the sense that there is only one way in which society can respond and therefore that the nature of the change is inevitable. The idea that alternative actions might be as appropriate and effective, and equally likely, is given little credence—the specific nature of the response is taken as requisite and the form of the response goes unquestioned: human agency (choice) is given little opportunity to make its mark. Cause and effect are favoured over choice, opportunism, innovation, and dynamic decision making, while the environment is seen as external to culture and shaped by natural rather than cultural forces. Moreover, this logic is self-fulfilling; things occur as they do because the result was inevitable and only one course of action was possible; ergo the problem is solved! Of course I am here describing an extreme position and most researchers today would see a much more dynamic interaction between humans and the natural world. However, unicausal thinking does remain pervasive in popular accounts (Diamond 2005, 1997; Fagan 2007: 16–17; Scarre 2005: 35) and in much influential academic work where technology, environment, and ecology remain prime mover explanations, at least partially at the expense of variable responses, individual agency, politics, and ideology (Algaze 2008: 151–4; Demarest 2004: 27–30; Pollock 1999: 22–5; Webster 2002: 327–43).

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Spatial Education: Improving Conservation Delivery Through Space-Structured Decision Making

Journal of Fish and Wildlife Management ◽

10.3996/082012-jfwm-069 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 4 (1) ◽

pp. 199-210 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Clinton T. Moore ◽

Terry L. Shaffer ◽

Jill J. Gannon

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Adaptive Management ◽

Land Management ◽

Natural Resource ◽

Spatial Context ◽

Biological Processes ◽

Landscape Conservation ◽

Structured Decision Making ◽

Landscape Conservation Cooperatives ◽

The U.S

Abstract Adaptive management is a form of structured decision making designed to guide management of natural resource systems when their behaviors are uncertain. Where decision making can be replicated across units of a landscape, learning can be accelerated, and biological processes can be understood in a larger spatial context. Broad-based partnerships among land management agencies, exemplified by Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (conservation partnerships created through the U.S. Department of the Interior), are potentially ideal environments for implementing spatially structured adaptive management programs.

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Modernizing Conceptions of Valuation and Cognitive-Control Deployment in Adolescent Risk Taking

Current Directions in Psychological Science ◽

10.1177/0963721419887361 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 29 (1) ◽

pp. 102-109 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Kathy T. Do ◽

Paul B. Sharp ◽

Eva H. Telzer

Keyword(s):

Decision Making ◽

Control System ◽

Cognitive Control ◽

Computational Model ◽

Risk Taking ◽

Expected Value ◽

Risky Decision Making ◽

Risky Decision ◽

Adolescent Risk ◽

Risk Taking Behavior

Heightened risk taking in adolescence has long been attributed to valuation systems overwhelming the deployment of cognitive control. However, this explanation of why adolescents engage in risk taking is insufficient given increasing evidence that risk-taking behavior can be strategic and involve elevated cognitive control. We argue that applying the expected-value-of-control computational model to adolescent risk taking can clarify under what conditions control is elevated or diminished during risky decision-making. Through this lens, we review research examining when adolescent risk taking might be due to—rather than a failure of—effective cognitive control and suggest compelling ways to test such hypotheses. This effort can resolve when risk taking arises from an immaturity of the control system itself, as opposed to arising from differences in what adolescents value relative to adults. It can also identify promising avenues for channeling cognitive control toward adaptive outcomes in adolescence.

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